Chapter 11: Chapter 11

“I’ll do it now.” Stay calm, stay calm. I won’t have to see her nor Lyle ever again very soon.

I could still hear her mumbling as I turned around to head to the kitchen, “Like a lifeless doll. I honestly don’t know what my son saw in you.”

To be honest, I didn’t know either. Perhaps he liked my stupidity, or maybe he liked the fact that he could get away with having an affair without me finding out.

I wanted to tell her that what was left on the table—the pan-grilled fish—was lunch but was scared that I would provoke her if I did.

So, I swiftly prepared a simple salad as well as an omelet to go on the side.

“What is all this?”

“Lunch.”

The half-eaten pan-grilled fish that Christopher had been picking at looked out of place among the other dishes on the dining table.

“Do you think I’m blind? I know it’s lunch,” she snapped. “I’m asking you what you cooked. Don’t try to change the subject.”

“Um… This is a pan-grilled fish, a salad, and an omelet.”

Wendy huffed. “My son is working to the bone. Not only does he have to manage the company, but he also has to be the breadwinner of the family. And this is all you’re feeding him?”

Yeah, right. I’m sure he’s working just as hard to get into some other woman’s pants.

I took a seat at the dining table, hanging my head as I let her words go in one ear and out the other.

My stomach was already grumbling out loud, and my patience was wearing thin. Are you done?

“You need to make a nutritionally balanced, full course meal next time with all sorts of options for him to choose from. Don’t you know how tired my son is after returning home from work every day?”

No, but I bet he must be tired from his daily hookups. “All right. I’ll make beef stew for him tonight.”

“How shameless.” She rolled her eyes at me.

Shameless enough to cheat on him. “You can go ahead and eat if you’d like. You said that you were hungry, right?” I offered, maintaining my polite smile despite feeling furious.

After all, I needed to keep up this act of a good wife before I brought up the topic of divorce to Lyle. This way, I would have more time to myself to settle my own affairs. I refused to be like other divorcees, who didn’t even have somewhere to stay after leaving their ex-husband’s house.

I seriously doubted that Lyle would pay any sort of alimony if we did get divorced.

Meanwhile, Wendy appeared at a loss for what to do, reluctantly taking the plate I was holding out to her.

She had barely taken a bite of the pan-grilled fish when her face suddenly flushed red, spitting out the contents in her mouth.

I stared at her as she dramatically clapped a hand to her mouth and fumbled around for a glass of water, then glanced back at the pan-grilled fish in confusion. Does it really taste that bad?

I cut off a tiny piece and slowly savored it in my mouth, nearly letting out a bark of laughter.

On the other hand, Wendy was desperately gulping down several mouthfuls of water. “What did you put in there?” she screamed at me.

I resisted the urge to grin. “Wasabi.”

All the blood drained from her face. “Why would you use wasabi while cooking pan-grilled fish?”

Um… How am I supposed to explain this? “I was going to make a sashimi dish, but I changed my mind halfway and accidentally ended up cooking pan-grilled fish.”

After all, I couldn’t possibly tell her that this had been Christopher’s doing.

Although she was furious, she didn’t dare eat another bite of the fish. She picked at the other dishes for a while before quickly making an excuse to leave as if she was scared that I would ask her to stay for dinner.

What goes around comes around!

A minute after Wendy left, Christopher sent me a message: How did she like my culinary skills?

I giggled to myself, quickly typing out a reply: It was alright. Although, the taste of the wasabi may have been a little too overpowering.

He texted back and added a cheeky grinning emoticon at the end of his message: I’ll keep that in mind.